Flatscreen to VR updates continue to breathe new life into old games
Flat Stanley.
I've been a bit too busy to do my usual VR Corner posts these past couple of weeks so I thought I'd take this moment of mid-week quiet to let you know about two recent flatscreen to VR updates that have been rocking my world.
First up there's a brand new mod for The Stanley Parable: Ultra Deluxe Edition from legendary VR modder Raicuparta. I've already featured a couple of Rai's flatscreen to VR mods on our YouTube channel, including his excellent Firewatch VR mod and his stunning Outer Wilds VR mod.
The Stanley Parable's story will already tie your head in knots, but with Rai's easy to install flatscreen to VR mod, you can experience the mindbending endings as if you were actually there. Rai's mod is available right now over on his Patreon if you'd like to try it out for yourself, but you can also watch me play through the first few endings in the video below.
On the offical side of things, Straight Back Games, the developer behind the terrifying team-based survival game Devour has just released an official VR update for the game.
Devour was scary enough already, with its tense collect-em-up meets jump-scare action, but the inclusion of VR takes those terrors to another level. Being fully immersed in the game's haunting environments is enough to put chills down even the warmest of spines, and nothing can quite prepare you for the shock of having one of Devour's many monsters grab hold of you in the dark.
If you'd like to watch Zoe Delahunty-Light and myself yelp our way through the new Asylum level of the game and get a taste of what it looks like to play the game in VR, you can do that in the video below.
I honestly feel like the world of offical VR releases has been struggling for a while now. Big budget releases have been binned off for games made specifially for the Quest and while these titles may be quicker and cheaper to produce, that convience also comes with the stink of shovelware.
I'm sure that will change with the impending release of the PSVR 2, but in the meantime, flatscreen to VR mods are keeping the scene very much alive for me. Converting old IPs into virtual reality makes classic games seem fresh and new and it feels like this is an open goal that many development studios haven't aimed for yet.
Thanks to modders like Raicuparta and developers like Straight Back Games, we do still get to glimpse the majesty of flat worlds made 3D and the results are rarely disappointing. Fingers crossed more studios take notice of their hard work as there are so many great games out there that could only be improved by optional VR functionality.
But what games would you like to see given the VR treatment? I think re-experiencing Bioshock's Rapture in VR would be incredible, but why limit it to classics? That there Stray game with its super detailed cyberpunk environments would be meow-vellous to explore through the eyes of the cat!